Fox's hat trick leads Otters past Steelheads

After scoring two goals at home against Guelph on Thanksgiving, Fox netted a hat trick -- increasing his league-leading total to 30 goals -- to lead the Otters over the Mississauga Steelheads 6-0 at the Hershey Centre on Friday night.

The victory, Erie's ninth in its past 10 games, improved the Otters' OHL-best record to 22-4-1.

Connor McDavid started the scoring just 3 minutes, 44 seconds into the first period on a feed from Andre Burakovsky, and Fox scored his first of the night 52 seconds later to make it 2-0.

The Otters, thoroughly dominating play, added goals from Burakovsky and Fox before the end of the period to open a 4-0 advantage.

Fox added his hat-trick goal at 5:16 of the second period and newcomer Brendan Gaunce completed the scoring with his first goal as an Otter 7:28 into the third period.

While the Otters were scoring seemingly at will, they also received stellar goaltending from Oscar Dansk, who made 26 saves in his third shutout of the season.

Connor Brown was all over the scoresheet, assisting on four goals, while defenseman Spencer Abraham contributed three assists and McDavid and Burakovsky each had a goal and an assist.

The two teams will meet again today at 7 p.m. at Erie Insurance Arena, where the Otters are a perfect 15-0 this season.